Humaid bin Thawr’s ‘ Ayniyyah between Implicitness and Explicitness

Abstract

Humaid bin Thawr's 'Ayniyyah (the poem ending with Othe rhyme) firmly establishes the Islamic concept regarding nature as it deeply discusses the Islamic conception of the cosmos, life andman.The poem falls into three parts: the first describes the clouds that do not rain and are taken as a symbol of life that is full of promises, yet it gives very little. The second part talks about Layla-the woman-as a symbol of life also. The third part is a moral describing the transience of life and the perpetuality of Almighty Allah, the owner of all things.This study reveals the beauty of the differences between the beginning of the poem and its end as well as the relations between its three parts. The poem makes use of exclamation, simile, paradoxes which involve antithesis and repetition and using Quranic lexis, thus establishing an Islamic authority deriving its beauty from the beauty of the Qur'an and its world (life, the hereafter, punishment, reward, offer and promise). In explaining the symbols and meanings we have relied on the extension of meaning by ancient critics. Doing so, we have come to see Humaid as an Islamic poet rather that a writer of love poems.